


The Plague of Time and Space

by AGJ1990



Category: Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-10-28 17:49:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20782640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AGJ1990/pseuds/AGJ1990
Summary: In the middle of trying to stop the Apocalypse, a stranger shows up to Bobby's and turns Evy's life upside down.





	1. 2010: To Be or Not to Be?

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: The characters of Supernatural do not belong to me. The original character of Evelyn Winchester does. 
> 
> A/N: Yes, I know I’m still working on The Things Unseen (Make the Soul Ache)-The In-Between and Citizen Winchester. I promise I am still working on them both. But this story has been in my head for a long while, so I finally sketched it out last night and started it. The first chapter isn’t very long, but everything gets explained as it moves on.

“You rocked out there, baby girl!”

“You know, complimenting me on my hunting is kind of undermined when you call me baby girl.” Evy commented.

Before Dean could respond, Bobby came out of the house. “You idjits get in here.”

“Nice to see you too.” Evy commented.

“Get in the house.”

“Bobby?” Evy asked, concerned that he wasn’t pressing her for details about the hunt he’d sent them on two days earlier. “What’s wrong?”

Sam and Dean finally noticed Bobby’s grim look too. “Bobby?” Sam asked, duffle still hung over his shoulder.

“There’s a guy in the living room looking for you.”

“A guy?” Evy asked. “Can you be a little more specific?”

“Just go see him. He said you’d know him when you saw him.”

“Bobby? You’re being weird.” Evy said.

“Just go. Sam, Dean, go with her.”

Evy turned to her brothers, shrugged, and walked inside. Sam, Dean, and Bobby followed close behind. Sam and Dean nearly crashed into Evy in the entranceway leading to the living room. She had stopped cold, and was staring at the stranger standing next to Bobby’s desk. He looked oddly familiar, with brown hair and brown eyes. He was a little shorter than Sam, and smiled at Evy as if he knew her.

“Peter?” Evy whispered. “Is that you?”

“Not quite.” The stranger answered. “Close, but not quite.”

Evy’s eyes glistened with tears as she came to a realization. “Connor?”

The stranger smiled wider and nodded.

“Cricket? Do you know him? Who is this?”

“He’s…” Evy swallowed, trying to stop herself from shaking. She put a hand to the wall to support herself. “He’s my son.”


	2. 2008: Misplaced Misadventure

_Last Chapter_

_Evy's eyes glistened with tears as she came to a realization. "Connor?"_

_The stranger smiled wider and nodded._

"_Cricket? Do you know him? Who is this?"_

"_He's…" Evy swallowed, trying to stop herself from shaking. She put a hand to the wall to support herself. "He's my son."_

Two Years Earlier

Evy woke to a pounding headache, and the certainty that she was not where she was supposed to be. She pushed herself up and clutched her forehead, trying to rub out the ache. When it didn't work, Evy slowly opened her eyes and looked around.

What felt like just a few seconds earlier, she'd been with Sam and Dean, poring over ways with Sam to save Dean from hell while arguing with Dean over whether or not to do it. She had gotten ticked off with Dean and walked away, telling her brothers she was 'going to take a walk'. She had gotten around a half mile away from Bobby's when she felt it.

Something was coming for her.

The next thing Evy knew, a bright light had surrounded her, and she'd felt herself falling down a deep, dark hole. She had a brief memory of Sam reading her _Alice in Wonderland _as a small child, and just as she thought it seemed to fit her situation, she was knocked unconscious.

Now, as she tried to take in her surroundings, she thought about her situation. She had no idea where she was. Not a clue. It was cold, much colder than it had been at Bobby's, so her only clue was that she was somewhere far north. Once she was satisfied that there was nothing that was going to come right out and attack her, she started to walk.

She walked for what felt to her like hours, but was probably no more than a half hour or so, when she came to a small town. It reminded Evy of Whoville from _How the Grinch Stole Christmas. _All the houses circled the outer part of town, with some businesses in the middle. Small children played out in the center of town, and from the way the sun looked to be positioned in the sky, it was afternoon going into evening. _They're out of school_, Evy thought. When she felt her stomach rumble, she knew that trying to keep walking on an empty stomach would be useless at this point, so she put her knife away and walked towards the town.

The people seemed friendly enough. They all nodded and waved hello to her. There was a bank, a toy store, a fire station, a library, a grocery store, a doctor's office, a drug store, and a police station. The biggest building in town was the school. It was divided into three sections, each labeled by grade level-elementary, middle, and high school. Evy's stomach rumbled again, and she made her way to what seemed to be the only place to eat in town, a small pub called Ryan's.

Being the middle of the afternoon, Evy was surprised to find the place so busy. She sought out a spot at the bar, the easiest place she could think of to keep an eye on everyone. When she sat down, she was almost immediately approached by the bartender.

"You don't look like you're from here."

"Um, I'm not." Evy said. "Just passing through."

"We're way out of the way for you to just be passing through."

"This may sound like a weird question, but where exactly am I?"

"A little early on the bottle, are we?"

"Excuse me?" Evy asked.

"You started drinking a little too soon." The bartender explained.

"I haven't been drinking. I'm just a little lost." Evy said irritably. "Could you please just tell me where we are?"

"Place called Jordan Valley. Little bit north of Anchorage."

"Anchorage? Anchorage, _Alaska_?" Evy asked disbelievingly.

"Aye. One and the same."

"Great. Just great." Evy said. "Do you have a phone I can use?"

"Sure. Right there on the wall. You want something to drink?"

"Um, sure. Coke, please."

"Coming up."

Evy went to the wall to use the payphone, and after thinking _who still has payphones anymore?_, she dialed the number to Bobby's house collect. She was surprised when the number came up as not in service, but not particularly worried. Only once she tried Dean's cell, and Sam's, and Bobby's, and Bobby's other _other_ cell, with none of the numbers working, did she become sick with worry.

She had somehow traveled thousands of miles from Bobby's, and was now lost in a remote town in a remote part of the country, with no cell phone, nothing on her but a little cash and her knife, and no personal possessions of any kind.

_Don't panic_, Evy thought. _Eat first, then figure out what to do._

Evy made her way back to the bar, where there was a tall glass waiting for her with a straw sticking out. "Thanks." she said to the bartender.

"No problem. On the house. Did you reach your friends?"

"Um, no. No, I didn't." Evy said. "I guess I'll have to find a place to stay tonight and collect my bearings."

"I've got a room upstairs for you if you need it."

"Oh, no thanks. I couldn't ask you to do that. Is there a motel or something nearby?"

"No. There's not. We're not used to getting visitors. I keep the room for the supply guys that come in and out of town and need a place to crash. It's not much, but it's quiet, private, got air, power, and water."

"Then I guess it'll do. How much?"

"How long you planning on staying in town for?" The bartender asked.

"I honestly don't know." Evy said.

"I'll make you a deal. You look like a smart kid. I'm looking for someone to help me keep the place clean. You do that for me, room's yours, plus three square meals a day, as long as you want it."

"Sounds too good to be true."

The bartender chuckled. "There's one drawback. It gets pretty rowdy in here at night, so it might be hard to sleep until early in the morning."

"All I'd have to do is clean?"

"Scout's honor."

Evy knew the offer was too good to be true, but she didn't plan to be here long. A day or two at the most, hopefully, but she knew that finding a viable option out of here was likely to take a lot longer than that. She knew that if Dean found out, he'd threaten to 'deal with this the way Dad would've', but she really had no other options. She knew how to take care of herself. Stay in the private, free room, or freeze out in the woods with no supplies.

"I'll take it." Evy said, offering her hand to the bartender. "I'm Evelyn. Everyone calls me Evy."

"I'm Ryan."

"As in Ryan's?" Evy asked.

"I'm the owner." Ryan explained. "And this handsome devil coming in now is my son."

"Dad, come on. Really?"

"Hey, you don't seem to have any luck with the ladies around here. So meet our newest tenant. Evelyn…"

"Evy. Evy Winchester."

Ryan's son, who had not had a good luck at his father's guest yet, turned and blushed when he saw Evy. "Hello there, Evy. Nice to meet you. I'm Peter."


	3. 2010: Quod Bonum Et Verum?

"He's your _what_, now?" Dean exclaimed.

Evy ignored Dean, forcing herself to let go of the wall and walk towards Connor. "I can't believe it."

"Me either."

"Do you still have your birthmark?" Evy asked.

"This one?"

Connor walked over to Bobby's couch and propped his leg up, pulling up the leg of his jeans almost to his knee. There was a star shaped red mark there that almost made Evy's knees give out.

"Oh, my God. It's really you."

"Yeah. It is. Hi, Mom."

"Hi, baby."

Evy finally embraced Connor, who had to bend down to be able to reach her. An awkward silence was forming behind her, as Sam, Dean, and Bobby looked at each other, wondering what exactly was going on.

"Hey, baby girl…"

"In a minute, Dean." Evy said. She took a step back from Connor and took a close look at him again. "What happened to you?"

"Could we talk about it in a minute? I've been travelling for a day and a half and I haven't eaten more than a granola bar."

"Oh, you must be starving. We'll fix that. Give me your coat."

"I can hang it up…"

"I know you can. Just let me do this for you, please."

"Sure. Here you go."

Connor handed his jacket over to Evy, who pushed him into the kitchen. Dean asked again what was going on, only to be shushed by Evy again. She made Connor sit down and quickly made him a sandwich. Once they were sitting back down, Sam decided to try and ask the question again.

"Cricket, what is going on?"

Evy sighed. "Connor, eat your lunch. We'll talk in a minute. Okay?"

"Yes, Mom."

"Okay. Here's the deal. Sam, Dean, Bobby, you remember when I went missing a couple years ago?"

"Of course we do." Sam said.

"Remember when I told you I had a family there?"

"You were only gone for twelve hours." Dean said.

Evy bit back a frustrated groan. _Don't you ever listen to me?_, she thought. "Dean, we've been over this. It was twelve hours here. It was sixty years for me.


	4. 2008: Looking for Home

**2008: Looking for Home**

“Where is she?”

“Sam, she’s only been gone forty-five minutes.”

“Something’s wrong, Dean.”

Dean wondered why he ever bothered questioning Sam’s intuition when it came to Evy. The two of them together gave Evy a lot more freedom than they’d ever gotten, and so far, she’d never abused it. While Evy had been known to leave and take a walk to blow off steam when angry with one or both of her brothers, she usually only stayed gone a few minutes before coming back and acting as if nothing had happened.

“You’re overreacting.”

“I’m going to look for her.” Sam said, standing up and grabbing his coat.

“Great. Now you’ll finally listen to me and stop trying to stop this.”

“Not by a long shot. Stay here in case she comes back.”

Sam searched for another thirty minutes around Bobby’s neighborhood for Evy. Evy didn’t have any friends around Bobby’s, so he knew it was a long shot, but he looked around anyway. He checked all her favorite spots-the library, the park, the diner she liked to go to, the coffee shop she went to when she wanted to be alone. By the time he came back to Bobby’s, Sam was panicking.

“She’s gone, Dean.”

“Yeah. She is. The neighbors just brought this back.”

Dean held up a familiar jacket. It was green with a white lining, with small, familiar cuts and scratches in various places.

“Where was this?”

“He found it at the end of his driveway when he went to check the mail.”

“Dean, it’s fifty degrees out there. She wouldn’t leave this behind.”

“You think she got taken?”

“Not willingly. But what I don’t know is if she got taken by something human or not.”

Evy had heard before that the number seven was lucky. But as she woke up on the morning of her seventh year living at Ryan’s, she couldn’t help but think that seven being lucky was completely bogus.

She had worked for Ryan since, and she couldn’t think of a better word for it, ‘landing’ in Jordan Valley. She knew that, if Dean were there, he’d be suspicious of a guy who would clothe, feed, and give a job to a kid he barely knew and expect nothing in return. But Evy didn’t have a choice. She’d made attempts to contact him and Sam by phone, but every number the two of them had was disconnected. The same was true for Bobby and every other hunter whose name and number she could remember.

Then things got really weird.

She’d travelled to Sioux Falls at the end of her first week in Jordan Valley. She’d gone directly to Bobby’s house and knocked on the door. Bobby didn’t live there and the lady living there had never heard of him. Her favorite diner was there, but none of the staff she knew worked there. Her coffee shop was there, but again, no one knew her.

Evy’s next stop had been the public library. The building was exactly the same. The same staff was there. Even the public wifi password was the same. But it was when Evy tried to find evidence of her family that she really began to panic.

She could find no evidence that Bobby Singer had ever lived in or around Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

She could find no evidence that Sam, Dean, John, or Mary Winchester had ever lived in Lawrence, Kansas.

She was able to access Stanford’s files, and could find no evidence that Sam had ever been there.

Jessica Moore was alive, with a husband named Brady and two children, Max and Everett.

She couldn’t find her birth certificate.

Most painful of all, Evy’s mother was still alive. She owned a diner in Florida. It had always been Evy’s deep seeded fear that she was the reason her mother had died. The fact that she was somehow alive now, in a world where Evy had never been born, only seemed to confirm that fear.

After two days of trying to find some kind of evidence that she existed, Evy decided that, somehow, she didn’t. She was in some alternate world where none of the Winchesters had ever been born. Most things in this world were the same. Historical events were virtually identical. Buildings were in the same place, the same people were there, but there was absolutely no evidence at all that she, her brothers, her father, or Bobby had ever existed. Not knowing what else to do, Evy had gone back to Jordan Valley, and Ryan had gladly taken her in again. She’d used her first few Sundays off to go to the University of Alaska library in Anchorage to try and research the situation, but after a year of that, she’d given up.

Now, she had a different problem. She was throwing up. Again.

She’d thrown up every day for the last week, three times a day, the same time of day every day. She’d finally gone to the doctor, after being pushed by Ryan and Peter both to do so. She waited now for the doctor to come back inside. The door opened and a smiling Dr. Kepner took a seat.

“Well, what’s the verdict, doc?”

“Well, you should be just fine. In a few months.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, young lady, that you need to stick around for an ultrasound.”

“An ultra…” Evy’s eyes grew larger as she realized what the doctor was saying. “No.”   


“Congrats, sweetie. You’re pregnant.”

Evy heard nothing else as a nurse brought in the ultrasound equipment. A few minutes later, she smiled as she watched the tiny spot on the screen move around. For once, she was glad that Sam and Dean hadn’t looked for her all these years.

“Hi, little baby. I’m your Mommy.”


	5. 2010: Two Worlds, One Family

**2010: Two Worlds, One Family**

"Connor, keep eating while I talk to Sam, Dean, and Bobby."

"Mom, I'm stuffed!"

"You're thin as a pole." Evy said, poking him playfully in the stomach. "Eat."

Connor smiled. "You sound like you did before…"

Evy suddenly stopped smiling as a painful memory came to her. "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault."

"What's not?" Sam asked, breaking Evy from her focus on Connor.

Evy sighed. "Okay. Here's the basics. Six years after I landed in that other…world, dimension, whatever you want to call it, I got married. A year after that, I got pregnant, and nine months later, I had this handsome devil." Connor smiled, and Evy walked behind him and kissed his cheek. "I had three other kids, four grandkids, and a sickeningly normal life. Except for one thing."

"What's that?" Bobby asked.

Evy took a chair and sat next to Connor, taking his hand. "That's what I hope he'll tell me. I woke up one morning and Connor was missing."

"Missing?" Dean asked.

"Yeah. He was sick the night before. He'd been throwing up all night, so I got the other kids up and got their dad to take them to school. Peter came back and went to check on Connor and he wasn't in his bed."

"Oh, my God. Baby, I'm so sorry." Sam said.

"Okay. Now that you guys are all caught up, I need to talk to Connor."

"I don't know what to tell you, Mom." Connor said.

"Okay. Let's start with this. It's been two years since I got back here. But you look about fifteen years older. Do you know how old you are?"

"When I landed in Anchorage, I was ten. Just like I had been when I disappeared. I started looking for you, but, it was like…"

"Take your time, honey. What happened?"

"I kept getting older every day."

"That generally happens." Dean remarked dryly.

"Dean. Shut up." Evy reprimanded. She was in no mood to deal with his sarcastic, suspicious nature at the moment. "What do you mean you were older?"

"Like, years older. A week later I looked sixteen. A month later, I looked twenty-one."

"So what have you been doing? Have you been living somewhere?" Evy asked. "How did they react to you changing so much?"

"I've just been moving around, trying to find you."

"You…you've been wandering around? For two years?"

"I'd stop places and work for a few days to get enough money for a hotel. In my downtime, I'd go to the library and try to find you or anyone with the same name. I don't know if you know this or not, but there's dozens of Evelyn Winchesters."

"You were ten years old? And all alone?"

Connor saw his mother's eyes fill with tears. "Mom, please don't."

"Baby, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry."

"I told you, it's not your fault. It's not your fault."

"I was supposed to protect you…"

"You did. You did protect me. As long as you could and as well as you knew how. I know that, Mom. I was never upset or angry with you. I figured you were either looking for me or, after a while, thought I was dead. I _never_ blamed you. Please don't put that on yourself. Please?"

"Okay. Okay, honey, I won't."

"Anyway, I wandered into Sioux Falls over a week ago and saw the coffee shop you used to tell me that story about in town."

Evy smiled. "I haven't thought about that in forever."

"I have. I remember every single thing you ever told me. It helped me find you. I figured since it matched the story exactly, you must be close by. I remembered the story you told me about Sir Sam and the gallant knights Robert and Dean too. So, I did a little asking around, and the sheriff pointed me here."

"I'm glad she did." Evy said, touching her palm to Connor's cheek. "You look exactly like your Dad."

"I miss him a lot."

"Me too."

"Baby girl, can we talk to you? In the living room, please?"

An annoyed Evy flashed Dean the female version of the Winchester glare, freezing the courage of both her brothers and Bobby. "No, Dean. I'm talking to him right now."

"Cricket? Please?"

"It's okay, Mom. I'm actually really tired. Could I lay down somewhere and take a nap?"

"You sure can. Come on, you can sleep in my room."

"I don't think so." Bobby said, speaking up from where he stood next to the kitchen sink, arms folded over his chest, the classic sign that he was annoyed but trying not to show it.

"And why's that?"

"What your brothers are afraid to say in front of him I'll say. I don't buy that he's your kid."

"Oh? And why's that?"

"A few reasons. One, he's older than you. You ain't having an older man sleep in your room. Period. Two, we don't know for a fact that he's who he says he is. Three, that world you were living in over there wasn't real. Anything that came out of it ain't real, either. Four, you're smart enough to know what I'm telling you is true."

John Winchester's ashes had been laid to rest more than three years earlier, but Bobby could swear that with Evy's stare towards him he'd come out of the ground and back into the house with no effort whatsoever.

"You done?" Evy asked coolly. "Sam, Dean, you agree with him?"

Dean looked all too eager and Sam reluctant, but both of them nodded.

"Mom, it's…"

"I swear to you, if you say it's okay, I will put you in time out. I don't care that I'm your mother and I'm ten years younger than you."

Connor wisely closed his mouth.

"As for you three. I don't care whether you believe me or not. He is my son. He is _my _family, whether this is the world I gave birth to him in or not. And if you give it a chance, he could become your family. Now, I already lost him once. I will not lose him again. If he goes, I go."

"Excuse me?" Dean asked incredulously. "You are seventeen, little missy. You don't get to dictate where you do and don't go…"

"Get off your hind legs, Dean. I'm not scared of you."

"Baitfish, I ain't put you over my knee since you came up to it. I will do it again if I have to."

"You can try." Evy dared him.

"Cricket, Dean's right." Sam said. "I'm sorry. You're not leaving."

A betrayed Evy stared at Sam so hard he had to look away from her, but Evy was unwavering. "I thought of all people, Sammy, you would understand. What it's like to have your life ripped away. You're telling me, right now, that if Jess came through that door, you wouldn't want another chance?"

"Jess is dead…"

"I know Jess is dead. I was there, remember? I watched her on that ceiling, bleeding to death. Did you think I'd forgotten that?"

"That's not what I meant…"

"Then stop deflecting and answer the question. If Jess came through that door, and she checked out, you're telling me you wouldn't want that second chance?"

Sam sighed. "No."

"Dean, same question. If Dad came back, or your and Sammy's mom, you wouldn't want that chance?"

"I would, baby girl, but I wouldn't trust it."

"Yeah. God forbid you ever leave what Dad told you to do and live a life of your own. Bobby? If your wife came back…"

"I get it." Bobby said. "Fine, kid. Go to bed."

"Connor, come on. Let's get you some rest."

When an angry Evy had left the room, all three men turned to each other in shock.

"You guys really trust him?" Dean asked.

"Hell no." Bobby answered.

"No. But let's let them have their moment for a while, then start looking into who that guy really is."


	6. 2008: Say Goodbye, 'Cause You Can't Go Back

**A/N: In the last chapter, when Evy was arguing with her family over Connor, Bobby told her that she was 'only fifteen'. I meant to say ** _ **seventeen** _ **. I've established it in my other Evy stories that Evy was born in 1993, ten years after Sam, so that would make her 15 in 2008 and 17 in 2010. My apologies, and I will go back and fix that.**

**2008: Say Goodbye 'Cause You Can't Go Back**

"Hey, babe? I'll be back."

"Okay. I got the kids. Do what you gotta do."

Evy smiled, sharing a quick kiss with Peter before walking slowly down the park's hiking trail. She absentmindedly kept a hand on her stomach, where she could feel one of the twins kick the other one.

"Sammy, stop kicking your brother."

The offending baby stopped kicking, then seemed to shift his position away from his brother as far as he could go. Which wasn't very far, considering they were both still inside Evy's very pregnant womb.

"All right, you two. That's enough in there. Mommy's going to talk to someone and I need you two to be quiet for a minute."

Surprisingly, both babies stilled and Evy smiled. She was so close to her due date that Peter had needed convincing she would be alright walking the less than quarter of a mile by herself. Evy considered sitting down, but knew that if she did, her chances of getting back up on her own were slim. Though she could hear Connor and his baby sister Isla laughing far off in the background, her heart wasn't with them today. Her heart was miles away, and maybe even worlds away, with a family that she still longed to see and say goodbye to. Double checking that no one was around, Evy began her speech, looking to the heavens and hoping, praying, that somehow she would be heard.

"Sammy, Deanie, it's me. Cricket. Baby girl. I'm still here. I don't know where exactly I am, or why you never found me. Or if you even looked for me to begin with."

Evy's heart clenched at the thought. Of course Sam and Dean had looked for her. She had to hold on to that hope. _No. Not hope. Certainty._ Without it, the entire time she'd spent looking for the two of them had been wasted.

"But I want you to know that I'm okay. I'm better than okay. I have this wonderful, amazing family here. A husband that loves me and that worships the ground I walk on. Two gorgeous kids and two more on the way. It's everything I ever wanted."

Evy wiped away a tear that sprung down her face when a sudden flashback of herself at ten years old sprang to her mind, unbidden. She had been living with Sam and Jess at Stanford for just over two months. She had heard Sam talking to a friend about Jess being 'the one' and wanting her to be 'the mother of all my children'. It had worried her, and she'd been quiet for days. Sam had been the one to mostly raise her. Did all that change now that he had a new woman in his life? When she finally confessed the truth to Sam about how she was feeling, he'd pulled her into his lap for one of his signature bear hugs and explained,

"There is no one and nothing in this world that could ever replace what you mean to me. Not Jess, not any kids that we might or might not have, nothing. My family will never be complete without you in it. Got it, Cricket?"

Evy shut her eyes against the happy but painful memory, and when she opened them again, she began what she'd come to the park that day to do. "Sammy, Deanie, I'm sorry. I want you to know, whatever happens, that I'm sorry. I tried to find you. I really did. And I know you tried to find me. I hope you guys are at some kind of peace right now, but knowing you, you're still poring over the lore or banging on doors trying to find me. I want you to know, too, that it's okay. I'm not mad you didn't find me. I'm really not. But I've come to say goodbye."

Evy choked on the 'goodbye', and she wept silently into her hands for a few moments, until some passing by joggers forced her to regain her composure.

"I can't do it anymore. I can't go back to the lore trying to find ways to contact the two of you. I can't try to comb through old Star Trek episodes hoping that I've somehow travelled back in time or to another world and there's some kind of path I can follow back to you. There's days I wake up and I wonder if my old life was even real. And then there's days where Peter makes me laugh and I swear it's you, Dean, pulling a joke on me. Or Connor does something to make me frustrated, and I'm in an argument with you, Sam. Or Isla makes a face at me and it's the two of you trying to tickle me to cheer me up. And it's on those days that I love you two the most, and that I miss you so badly. But like I said, guys, this is it. It's been ten years, and I'm hanging up my hat. Goodbye, you guys."

Evy wanted to weep again when she said goodbye, but was cut off by the sensation of a pair of small, skinny arms wrapping themselves around her legs. When she looked down, she could barely see Connor's face grinning back at her mischievously over her own pregnant belly.

"What are you doing, monkey?"

"Missed my mommy." Connor said, squeezing his mother's legs again.

On Evy's other leg, she felt an even tinier pair of arms squeezing her. "I can't see, but that down there must be baby Izzie."

"Mommy!"

"Sorry, babe." Peter said, running up after the two energetic toddlers. "They wouldn't stop begging for you. You'd think you'd been gone for days."

"Uh huh. They wouldn't stop begging or you got worried?"

Peter shrugged. "Maybe both."

"That's what I thought."

"I'm sorry. I know you hate me mother henning you when you're pregnant."

"It's okay." Evy said. "It really is. I'm done here anyway. Can you pick up Izzie? I'm scared I'm gonna step on her since I can't see her."

"Got her."

"And you, baby boy," Evy said, waving Connor out from under her, "need to walk in front of Mommy so I can see you. Okay?"

"Okay. Can I race back?"

"No. No running since Mommy can't keep…" Evy suddenly grabbed Peter's arm when she felt a familiar sensation that only meant one thing.

"Babe?"

"Pack up lunch and take the kids to your dad."

"What's going on?" Peter asked. "You okay?"

"But the picnic!" Connor complained. "You and Daddy promised!"

"Connie, honey, I know we did and I'm so sorry, baby. I swear to you we will have a picnic. But Mommy needs to get home right now and get ready to go."

Connor, who'd been helping in the best three-year-old way he knew how to help his mother prepare for the birth of his two new siblings, realized what was about to happen and gasped. "The babies are coming?"

"Not for a little while, but they just told me they're ready."

At the exact moment Evy's water broke, Sam was rechecking the conclusion he'd come to almost two minutes earlier. If he was right, then the problem was so much worse than Evy just being missing.

Inside Evy's jacket, Sam had found a gray substance that they'd never encountered before. It was thick and gray to the touch, but if left on a surface longer than a few seconds, it evaporated into thin air. Only through dumb luck had they discovered that waving a hand through the area where the substance had just evaporated led to it taking shape in the hand again.

Sam had immediately researched 'thick gray slimy material found at disappearance' and was surprised to find that a lot of the sources he used agreed. The substance had different names, but the purpose was the same-to transport anyone who stumbled onto it into another plane of existence. What exactly happened there no one seemed to agree. But it was the best lead Sam had at the moment.

Sam finished the math he'd just worked out and leaned back in his chair. "What the hell?"

Bobby and Dean, who were across the room arguing over the best strategy to move forward, stopped and turned to Sam, the distress in his voice making them both nervous. Neither of them were entirely convinced of Sam's 'other world' theory, but they had no other explanation at the moment.

"Sam, what is it?" Bobby asked.

"I, um, found a lore reference that verifies the other world theory."

"What? Where?"

"Here." Sam said, pointing to the book in front of him.

Bobby walked over and glanced at the weighty ancient tome, one that had been in his library for as long as he could remember but that barely had been used. He read some of the passage that Sam was pointing to and nodded. "I guess you're right, boy. What I can translate off the bat seems to say so."

"That's good, isn't it?" Dean questioned. "So we translate the passage and we should be good to go to get her back, right?"

"This research. It, um, says that time moves faster when we travel outside of our own plane of existence."

"Faster? How much faster?" Dean asked.

"About 40,000 times faster, if I'm right."

Dean shrugged, the relief at having found some kind of solution taking a little of the tension off his shoulders. "Baby girl'll be okay until we find her, right?"

Sam swallowed hard. "No, Dean. She won't be."

"Why, Sam? What aren't you telling us?"

"I've been doing the math. If time is travelling faster for Evy, I wanted to know how long she thought she'd been gone."

"And?"

"Damn it!" Bobby exclaimed, glancing over at Sam's work.

"It means, Dean, that while we've been looking for Evy for two hours, for her, it's been ten years."


	7. Chapter 7

Since when do you cook like this?"

It had been two and a half hours since Connor had shown up. Sam and Dean had spent the time alternating between staying close by to keep an eye on Connor and researching who Connor could be. Bobby had spent the time trying to openly argue with Evy, then brooding at his desk after she shut him down.

"I'm not arguing with you, Bobby. If you're so against him being here, we'll leave. Now I love you. I really do. But whether you recognize him or not, he's my son and I'm not giving him up again. Now what's it gonna be?"

Though Bobby would never admit it to anyone else, Evy intimidated him. On the one hand, she had the stubbornness of her father, the fierceness of the mother that she had never known, more brains than anyone else Bobby had ever met, and was stronger than both of her brothers combined. But on the other hand, there were times when he looked at her and all he saw was the tiny, sweet, perpetually cute little kid she had been. The one who had once had a twenty minute long argument with him while sitting on his lap eating Cheerios about the fact that she was _not _a baby. He was her 'uncle Baby' and she was his Evy. Thinking of their first fight was making Bobby feel nostalgic, something he didn't particularly enjoy.

As Evy pulled out the rest of the ingredients she needed for dinner, she smiled. She'd cooked for her brothers and Bobby before, but she was working on what was a massive meal for them. Homemade barbeque chicken, mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, and green peas. It was the first time in two hours that Bobby had talked to her.

"There's a lot of things you doin't know about me, Bobby."

"I'm startin' to see that."

Evy sighed and turned back to him. "Look. I get why you don't really trust Connor. But you and Dean and Sam have to understand. Those twelve hours that I was missing was a lifetime for me. When I landed in Jordan Valley, I was fifteen. When I came back here, before I ever woke up, I was seventy-five with a bad hip. I was raising my teenage granddaughter. I had just been diagnosed with kidney cancer..."

"You had cancer?"

Evy looked up and found Connor standing in the entranceway to the living room. "Hey, baby. You okay?"

"I'm fine. You had cancer?"

Evy sighed. "Yes. I had the very early signs of it, and the doctor was sure he'd be able to help."

"What happened?"

"Well, I came back here before he could do anything about it. The second I was back here, when I could get a little time to myself, I got checked out and I'm completely healthy."

"When was this?" Bobby asked.

"Remember when I insisted on having a checkup two weeks later? And I wouldn't let anyone go with me?"

"You're sure you're okay?"

"Yes, baby, I'm fine."

"Okay." Connor replied, still unsure but too tired not to accept Evy's word for it. "Do you have a minute? I want to show you something."

"Sure."

"Do you still have the bag I gave you?" Connor asked, turning to Bobby for the first time since he'd arrived.

"Yeah."

"Can I have it please? There was a book in it I want to show Mom."

Bobby reluctantly handed the bag over to Connor, who pulled out a large black sketchbook and handed it to his mother. Evy forgot about the dinner on the counter and grabbed the book, joining Connor on the couch. Sam and Dean had joined them, so that again, everyone was together in the same room. Evy knew they were only there because they were trying to watch out for her, but she was too tired to argue with them now. When she opened the first page of the sketchbook, Evy gasped and put a hand to her mouth.

"Oh, Connor. What is this?"

"Well, I didn't have any photographs, so I started drawing the ones I could remember."

The picture Evy was looking at was her wedding photo. Sam, Dean, and Bobby each looked over her shoulder and watched her reactions. There were people around them, but the focus was on Evy and another man that her brothers and Bobby had never seen. Evy wore a long white dress that flowed to her knees, and had a smile that Sam and Dean hadn't seen since before she knew the truth about the supernatural at age three.

"Mom?"

"I'm okay."

"No, you're not. You're crying."

"I really am okay." Evy repeated. Despite the fact that she was crying heavily, she was still able to keep herself calm enough to calm Connor. _Just like when I was your mom the first time, _she thought. "I just haven't seen any pictures of your dad in a really long time."

"There's more."

"I'll look, just give me a minute."

Two hours passed as Ellie and Connor reminisced over various photos. He had recreated Evy's wedding, her pregnancy with all four kids, various friends and other family members, birthday parties, vacations, and a few other completely normal, family things. When Evy closed the last page, she checked the clock.

"Oh, no. I forgot about dinner!"

"It's okay, Mom."

"You guys must be starving."

"We already ate." An annoyed Dean said from the kitchen.

"We put everything up for you." Sam said.

"Thanks." Evy said. She turned to Connor and asked, "So why don't you and me go out for dinner? I can catch you up on your dad and sister and brothers."

"And why can't we hear this?"

"Because I want to talk to him alone, Dean. Is that a problem?"

"Yes." Dean stood up from the kitchen table and walked back in, but Evy's firm stare almost made him wither. "I don't want you two to be alone."

"Too bad."

"Mom? It's okay. I kinda want them to see something."

"You want them to see something?"

"Yeah. Do you trust me?" Connor asked.

"Sure. Why don't you go wait for us on the porch?" When Connor was outside, Evy turned back to Dean. "What's your problem?"

"What do you mean?"

"You're acting like a jerk. What gives?"

"I just don't trust this guy. Not until we verify his story. And he seems to have some kind of hold on you."

"Yeah. That's called being my son."

"He's not your son."

"Dean, no matter what you think, I know he is my kid. I carried him in here. I carried his sister and his two brothers in here."

"Look, I know you had some kind of perfect life over there, but I'll say it again. _It wasn't real._"

"For once in your life, Dean, shut up."

Dean's mouth moved up and down, but no sound came out.

"You know nothing about my life over there. For the first few years, until Connor disappeared, yeah, it was mostly good. But I spent a year looking for you and Sam. A year. Once I knew I wasn't going to find you, yeah, I lived my life. But I still looked. I went to the university library every weekend trying to find something new. Anything at all that could help me find you. I did that for ten years."

"It was only…"

"Don't tell me it was only a few hours. It wasn't a few hours to me, Dean. It was a lifetime. And as for it being perfect? After Connor went missing and we couldn't find him, Peter started drinking. A lot. For five years, he'd drink himself stupid then come home and fight with me."

"Fight? Fight how?"

"He hit me, Dean. A lot. And then at night, after he'd pass out, I'd sit in bed crying wondering where the hell you two were and why you weren't around to protect me."

Dean immediately faltered.

"Don't look at me like that, Dean. I took care of myself. I got my kids and moved with them to their grandfather's house, until Peter got some help. After that, I had two miscarriages, lost another son in the military, lost Peter on our fortieth wedding anniversary, then was diagnosed with cancer after that. So don't talk about my 'perfect life' when you know nothing about it."

Dean nodded. "Okay. I get it. I'm sorry."

"Now, he invited you to come with us. If you want to, fine. If you don't, that's fine too. But I expect all of you to be polite to him. Am I clear?"

Sam, Dean, and Bobby all nodded.

"Okay, let's go."

Evy and Connor walked towards town, Sam next to them, Dean and Bobby trailing behind. Connor stopped in front of the coffee shop in town, the one Evy usually went to when she wanted to be alone.

"I thought it was time they learned something about you they don't seem to know."

"What are you talking about?" Evy asked, before looking at the sign in front of the coffee shop. "Oh, no."

"Come on, Mom. Do it, please?"

"What are you two talking about?" Sam asked.

Evy sighed. "He wants me to do open mic night."


End file.
